The blurred line between terrorism and random, senseless violence displayed itself when Man Haron Monis, an Iranian-born asylum-seeker in Australia, took a number of hostages at the Lindt Café in Sydney. I call it a "blurred line" because although this miscreant seems to have meant to portray his actions as being aligned in some way with militant Islamicism, he genuinely seems to have been a pretty run-of the mill basic human horror-show of abusive behavior, predation, and self-aggrandizement.
Any culture could generate one of these--he sent hate letters to families of dead Australian soldiers killed in the Afghanistan conflict; pretty Westboro Baptist, I think. He apparently claimed to have "black magic" powers and sexually assaulted numerous women, as a kind of predatory guru-type. He played up his own sense of victimization.
It's hard--no, impossible, to reconcile this personality-type with doing anything for a "cause", because I see someone like this as feeling his biggest cause is himself. So all that Islamic-flag in the window business is stage-dressing for his personal drama.
And if his despicable hostage-taking and murders leave us despairing of whether humans just suck out loud--here is something genuinely touching. #illridewithyou is a reminder that there's something other than bigotry and a mindset of retribution. Most people don't suck--being a good human being means caring about others. And we mostly do. It's those that don't who make things so shitty for the rest of us.
No comments:
Post a Comment